Florence’s remnants could reform, double back on Carolinas

Friday

The storm’s fragments are now in the Atlantic, and they have a chance of becoming another tropical storm.

WILMINGTON, N.C. — It’s the storm that just won’t die.

A week after Hurricane Florence pummeled the region with wind and rain, the remnants of the storm haven’t dissipated and now have a slim chance to reform for a second go at the Cape Fear coast.

The National Hurricane Center is still monitoring the storm as it moves out into the Atlantic, but the latest track shows a 20 percent chance of reforming.

Victoria Oliva, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service’s Wilmington office, said while there is a chance reforming, it is not likely to find the extremely favorable conditions that fueled Florence.

“It is moving very slow and it is not in a good environment,” she said. “Right now, it is just a small system of storms. But there is a lot of dry air and strong upper level winds that would create shear, which tropical storms don’t like.”

The current track has the system moving southwest and then northeast, at which time it will become clear if it poses another threat to the United States.

If it survives despite those unfavorable conditions, Oliva said it could still influence the region’s forecast.

“It could bring some rainfall, but that might be seven or more days out,” she said. “Right now, it is all very, very unsure.”

If the tropical system reforms, it wouldn’t retain the name that has now been etched in the Carolinas’ history books; it would be renamed Kirk.